D&D General why do we have halflings and gnomes?

[Charlaquin]

You are fundamentaly misunderstanding my point.

I am not saying that a halfling cannot have their own individuality.

I am saying that a halfling has to mostly abandon the priorities and ideals of their racial culture in order to be an adventurer. A halfling has to sacrifice a great deal their halflingness to adventure. This is because the race mostly converges to a few simplistic archetypes and the race is known for its lack of ambition, vainglory, showiness, and industriousness.

The problem is, you’re treating it as self-evident that this makes them ill-suited to being a PC race, and most of us just don’t see it. Who cares if halfling adventurers are all exceptions to their cultural tendencies? All adventurers are exceptions to their culture’s tendencies. And being particularly disinclined towards adventurous behavior gives halflings a unique niche compared to other races. That’s a good thing.

Not a bad race but it is written like NPCs. So a PC halfling has to be a weirdo or tragedy to justify itself

You’re showing us two points:

a.) Halfling PCs have to be exceptional among their people to narratively justify their reasons for adventuring

and

b.) Halflings are written like NPCs

and failing to draw a line connecting them. I understand that you think a leads to b, but I don’t see how it does and you have done nothing to demonstrate it. You just keep stating that it does and expecting everyone to see it.

 

[Voadam]

1e had forest gnomes and the deep gnomes of the underdark. Forest gnomes of hills/earth and little tough guys of rock with a more fairy magic aspect than normal dwarves plus the illusionist angle

1e then added Dragonlance tinker gnomes which have become a big niche concept for them.

2e sent tinker gnomes into space and across worlds with Spelljammer.

2e also had the grim world of Dark Sun having genocided gnomes in its ancient history so none are there currently.

Pathfinder and 4e had gnomes from the First World/Feywild. Pathfinder has anime colored hair and 4e has spooky black eyes. Pathfinder had them leaving the First World of fey in the past for some unknown reason. Their tie is so strong however that if they do not have enough wonder in their life they suffer from bleaching.

Midgard took the fey story and ran with it by having all the gnomes on the run for a prince of theirs having crossed Baba Yaga and she now genocidally hunts them. A prince of gnomes made a deal with devils to protect a community of his people for a big regular evil cost.

In Cultures of Celmae Gnomes by Wayward Rogues Publishing the gnomes were an underdark people who defended the world from Gugs until they were forced to the surface by the cataclysm and now they are trying to find a place in the surface world.

 

[Gammadoodler]

It seems strange to suggest that being narratively pastoral by nature means halflings should not be adventurers.

Would you also say that pastoral human communities are unfit sources for adventurers? Because it seems to me that's actually common enough to be considered a trope. How many farmboys grow up to be heroes in fantasy literature?

 

[Voadam]

Halflings started off as Hobbits in 0e and stayed there awhile.

B/X and 3e made them slimmer.

A few take offs of the standard were things like the Fineous Fingers halfling mafia from early Dragon comics which you can see thematically in other contexts like the Benevolent Society for the Advancement of Halflings in Freeport.

2e Dark Sun had cannibal halflings with lifeshaping magic and a background of world domination.

3e added dinosaur riding halflings in Eberron.

Pathfinder had halflings as tagged onto human cultures but best known for being enslaved in devil worshipping Cheliax.

4e went with a sort of river gypsy nomad theme.

 

[Khelon Testudo]

the little folk in the film "Legend" had a very Gnome feel to them (I don't recall if they were ever identified as "dwarf" or "gnome" in the film)

They were goblins, Gumps lot.

 

[Umbran]

All adventurers are exceptions to their culture’s tendencies.

Yeah. That's going to be pretty true of any culture that uses agriculture. Once you have farms and towns and cities, your culture is, by and large, about being part of those communities.

 

[Scott Christian]

Halflings are awesome! I played a halfling 5e bard. Enjoyed every second of Welby Flutepop until he got his head smashed in by a dwarf. He was the singer, chef, and jokester. That's a pretty fun character to play at any table.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

You can say that but...

1) Why not, other than being a little lucky and a little sneaky, halflings aren't any scarier than anything else people go to war with. See Goblins.

2) How many evil empires are run by people who are not fools?

2 I’ll grant you, but even fools can see that a small fertile valley isn’t worth losing a fight over. (It’s not like halflings need a ton of land, after all)

1 It’s my opinion that halflings are the single worst enemy to try and take on in the phb.

 

[Tonguez]

2 I’ll grant you, but even fools can see that a small fertile valley isn’t worth losing a fight over. (It’s not like halflings need a ton of land, after all)

I dont see why Halflings would need any less land than a human peasant. They may be half the height, but Hobbits had 7 meals a day and I've seen nothing to state that Halflings eat substantially less than Humans do. If the Haflings are agraian then they would not about as much land as a human settlement of the same size

 

[FrozenNorth]

2e Dark Sun had cannibal halflings with lifeshaping magic and a background of world domination.

3e added dinosaur riding halflings in Eberron.

Pathfinder had halflings as tagged onto human cultures but best known for being enslaved in devil worshipping Cheliax.

4e went with a sort of river gypsy nomad theme.

...and 5e gave them freakishly misshapen heads.